Article excerpt

Procter & Gamble, the Cincinnati-based company behind Pampers
diapers and Tide detergent, reported a federal tax burden in 1969
that was 40 percent of its total profits, a typical rate in those
days.

More than four decades later, P&G is a very different company,
with operations that span the globe. It also reports paying a very
different portion of its profits in federal taxes: 15 percent.

The world's biggest maker of consumer products isn't the only
one. Most of the 30 companies listed on the Dow Jones industrial
average have seen a dramatically smaller percentage of their profits
go to U.S. coffers over time, even as their share prices have driven
the Dow to an all-time high.

A Washington Post analysis found that in the late 1960s and early
1970s, companies in the current Dow 30 routinely cited U.S. federal
tax expenses that were 25 to 50 percent of their worldwide profits.
Now, most report less than half that share.

Still, company executives have complained for years that their
firms face the highest tax burden in the world, citing the United
States' 35 percent top corporate tax rate as the highest among
developed economies.

P&G chief executive Bob McDonald was among 20 business executives
including other leaders of Dow 30 companies who met with President
Barack Obama in November to discuss the country's fiscal issues,
including the tax code. …